Statements and writings emanating from influential strategists of the G7 emphasize about how important it is to retain western global primacy, remarks that several countries in Asia, Africa and South America imply a desire to reclaim the lost dominance of the Atlanticists over the Global South. The origins of the European Union were based on a substitution of the notion of European exceptionalism superceding that of German superiority propagated by Hitler. Citizens of countries within the EU remain free to work, live and travel in any part of that group, irrespective of (or their lack of) their professional capabilities and personality traits. Whether they are unqualified to hold high value jobs or even have a predilection towards anti-social behaviour (such as regularly getting drunk or entering into fistfights with others), as long as they are European, they are welcome across national borders within the EU. In contrast, an engineer or a techie from India faces multiple barriers to entry, despite the fact that they have the potential to be not just productive citizens but taxpayers as well. Given such an ethnocentric beginning and structure, it is ironic that citizens of countries within the EU are abandoning the priority given to a European rather than a national identity. They are increasingly voting for political parties that stress national identity over the European.
In the UK, the growing support within the Tory base secured by the Reform Party led by Nigel Farage seems on track by July 4 to be the cause of a historically humiliating defeat for the Conservative Party at the hands of Labour, which has been out of power for 15 years. In France, President Emmanuel Macron is seeing his Renaissance Party slide substantially at the polls, even as the National Rally led by Marine Le Pen looks to be having her nominee as the next Prime Minister of France. The French National Assembly elections that President Macron impulsively announced after the poor showing of his Renaissance Party in the European elections would make him a Lame Duck. As with Sunak, in the coming polls in Germany, Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who cast aside the Ostpolitik of Willy Brandt and Gerhard Schroeder, and who has instead adopted an obsessive animus towards Russia since that country’s invasion of Ukraine war began on February 24, 2022. The Alternative for Deutschland (AfD) has in contrast adopted a line much more conciliatory towards Russia, which is why there is scarcely any impact when Scholz labels the AfD as “neo-Nazi”. As Hitler in “Mein Kampf” made clear, there were no Russophobes more virulent than the Nazi Party. And between Scholz and the Greens, they seem far more Russophobic than the AfD, although fortunately not sharing any other trait of the psychotic who ruled Germany during 1933-45.
As was repeated in these columns since the Russia-Ukraine war started in 2022, barring Giorgia Meloni with her more nuanced position, the G7 leaders, who have been leading the charge against Russia, are in danger of losing the next national polls. Why sanctions were imposed on Russia that had the impact of raising inflation, creating tensions between the G7 and the Global South, and harming NATO member states in several ways is explainable only by the misperception of the G7 leaders in 2022 that Vladimir Putin was on the ropes, as in their reckoning was Russia, and that Putin was on the way out of the Kremlin. In June 1941, Adolf Hitler had predicted at the start of his war on the Soviet Union that “One strong kick and the whole rotten structure the Soviet Union and Stalin himself would come crashing down”. By the close of the next year, it was obvious that he was wrong. By the close of 1943, it was evident that Hitler had ensured for Germany’s defeat in the war that he had launched on Stalin and Russia. While a few collaborators had been won over by the Nazis to fight on the German side in the western parts of the Soviet Union, very soon almost the entire country realised that while Stalin was a tyrant, Hitler was worse, much worse, as their ruler. They unified against Hitler and at the cost of tens of millions of lives lost, rolled back the Wehrmacht. Underestimating the Russian people was a foolhardy enterprise by a tyrant with few parallels in history. NATO needs to immediately veer away from igniting a direct conflict with Russia, although at present it seems to be heading towards just such a catastrophe.
Within voters in members states of the Atlantic Alliance, the message appears to be dawning that by NATO seeking to make the governance institutions of Russia crumble through using Ukraine as a proxy, the war is on course to end western primacy within the international order. The G7 Heads of Government meeting in Italy has been called a gathering of “Six lame duck leaders and Giorgia Meloni”, who incidentally has cordial relations with Prime Minister Modi. The third term PM of India has been meeting six of seven peers who appear certain not to have the same success when they themselves face the hustings. The attention given to Prime Minister Modi at the G7 summit showcases the fact that in initiatives taken by the G7 in the Indo-Pacific, India is indispensable for success in such initiatives.